Large scale coherence of the mesospheric and upper stratospheric temperature fluctuations

Abstract

A large set of temperature profiles has been obtained in the upper stratosphere and the mesosphere over Europe during the MAP/WINE compaign by the use of different techniques: datasondes and falling spheres launched by metrockets, ground-based OH spectrometers and a Rayleigh lidar. These data have been used to study the large scale variability of the middle atmosphere during the winter 1983–1984. The temperature variations with periods longer than 25 days are clearly related to the succession of minor upper stratospheric warmings observed during this winter. The variations in the period range 10–20 days are at least partially due to westward propagating Rossby waves, of which one mode, with a 12.5 days period, is tentatively identified as the second symmetric mode of the wave number 2.